Eight-Week CLS Program for American Students Completed Successfully

Tainan, Taiwan, August 16, 2017

The eight-week U.S. Department of State’s Critical Language Scholarship (CLS) Program at National Cheng Kung University (NCKU) came to an end. On August 4th, 23 participants all took the stage to give remarkable performances like short dramas and stand-up comedies to show what they have learned from the program.

Eric Scheel and Phillip Ng performed a stand-up comedy, which combined Chinese idioms into the show. They used puns to put dozens of Chinese idioms in one sentence, showing its true connection with Chinese culture. The preparation of the show was not an easy job for them because they had to memorize all the Chinese idioms they used in the show. Nonetheless, they learned how to use Mandarin Chinese more accurately through the preparation of the show.

“My Mandarin Chinese ability was better than most of the students back in my hometown, so it was pretty hard for me to make improvements back there. Coming to Taiwan and staying with Taiwanese people all day long truly helped me sharpen my language skills. I also learned some Taiwanese from my homestay family. Now I am planning to engage in diplomatic affairs for my job in the future,” said Eric.

Phillip said, “My family members communicate with each other in English most of the time. After I grew up, I began to learn Mandarin Chinese for I wanted to get to know more about the cultural background of my own. I have been learning Mandarin Chinese for seven years, and I can communicate with people fluently. However, grammar is relatively hard for me. Learning at NCKU Chinese Language Center (CLC) really helps me improve my grammar.”

NCKU CLC pointed out how Chinese proficiency of all 20 participants last year improved at least one level. Nine participants increased two levels, and three levels for five students! This year, the U.S. Department of State especially requested that global competence be incorporated into the courses of CLS program, hoping that the participants could communicate and collaborate with others effectively while appreciating cultural differences.

To enhance participants’ global competence, NCKU CLC arranged a home-stay family for every student. It also assigned one buddy to accompany each student and took the participant to visit places in Taiwan. It is the hope of NCKU that besides learning Chinese, the participants could get to know more about Taiwan.